Sometimes we make big mistakes in the name of loyalty. Someone wrongs a friend, we seek retaliation, but only make the situation more strained and harder to deal with. It’s how bar fights get started, or any stupid act under the guise of honor and friendship. But there is a good sentiment behind the stupidity and wrongheadedness. Tonight’s episode of Lost Girl is one of the best of the series so far, and it explores the good and bad ways of expressing loyalty to a friend. It gives some scruples of back-story on Kenzi’s family life, and reinforces the bond between her and Bo as the most important on the show.
Bo is slowly moving on from Dyson, but she’s still hurt. Kenzi senses this, and while the two of them get blackout drunk, she offers up the idea of cursing Dyson as revenge. Something to cut off his manhood—or another equally grotesque measure—is quickly shot down, but Kenzi brings up Baba Yaga, a witch from Slavic folklore who helps scorned women take out their grudges on men who have wrong them. Bo rejects the idea, saying they’re “still the good guys,” but Kenzi, recognizing a deeper sadness in Bo, decides to try and summon the witch anyway. She has no idea if that creature even exists, but she writes Dyson’s name on a mirror in lipstick, speaks some Russian, and suddenly there’s a curse.
Kenzi makes a drunken mistake. Did she do it because she was too far gone to think of the consequences, or because she truly wanted to take vengeance on Dyson for hurting Bo? She’s just trying to be a loyal friend, but she ends up making the situation much, much worse. Any woman flies into a rage whenever Dyson is around, and he and Bo are both branded with a mark from Baba Yaga as a sign of the curse between them.
Dyson is incredibly frustrated, and he takes out his anger on Bo, who then turns on Kenzi, blaming her for their predicament. It’s true, but not fair, since she was only trying to help. For some reason, it reminds me of Darcy advising Bingley in Pride And Prejudice—another situation in which someone makes the wrong decision that prolongs emotional suffering in the service of a friend. Kenzi tries to do something for Bo to ease her suffering and give them both a laugh, but she’s so new to the Fae world that she doesn’t understand the consequences of her actions. Dyson is old enough to remember charming nuns during the Crusades, and he never misses an opportunity to come down hard on Bo and Kenzi for not knowing enough.
In order to reverse the effects, Kenzi and Bo seek out Kenzi’s aunt, a fortune teller in a trailer park. It’s clear that Kenzi stays away from her family due to some nasty childhood trauma, particularly at the hands of her stepfather. But it’s nice to see that not all was bad, as her aunt is a sweet and strange woman, who reluctantly helps bring Baba Yaga forth in a kind of blood ritual that puts Kenzi into a trance. In exchange for lifting the curse, the strange mid-world dwelling witch wants to take ownership of Bo. That’s when Kenzi gets hit with an idea for self-sacrifice, and gets pulled through the mirror into Baba Yaga’s world, a cottage lined with jail cells for women caught in the same reverse-bargain trap.
This mini-world outside of Fae control forces Kenzi to face her leftover childhood fear of this witch, and trying to save all the other girls before they get tossed in a big furnace. Meanwhile, Bo is busy fighting to get into Baba Yaga’s cottage, going so far as to offer up freelance services to Lachlan, the new Ash, whom she despises so much for looking down on humans. With the help of a water nymph and Dyson, Bo makes the jump into Baba Yaga’s world, where her powers don’t help her, but just showing up seems to give Kenzi the power to face her fears, fight back, and win for the first time without Bo’s physical help.